


A Real Man

by cloudycelebrations



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Activism, Anal Sex, Banned Together Bingo 2020, Banned Together Bingo Fill: Patriarchy, Blanket Permission, Civil Rights Movement, DIY Masculinity, Fluff, Gender Issues, Happy Ending, M/M, POV Bucky Barnes, Patriarchy, Period-Typical Homophobia, Social Issues, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:07:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24279343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudycelebrations/pseuds/cloudycelebrations
Summary: Five times Bucky runs up against the patriarchy. And in most of those, says "fuck that" and makes his own masculinity.Written for “Patriarchy” bingo square for Banned Together Bingo 2020.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 18
Kudos: 176
Collections: Banned Banned Together Bingo 2020, Banned Together Bingo 2020





	A Real Man

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tomix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tomix/gifts).



> Thank you to ZepysGirl and ladivvinatravestia for beta help!!

1\. 1938. Two women walk past Bucky on his lunch break, trying not to make it obvious how intently they’re looking at him. He glances down at his sandwich to see if it’s falling apart, reaches up to his face to see if there’s something on it. Probably dirt from the construction site. As they walk away, he overhears one gal say to her friend, “Now that’s a real man.”

Flattered at first, Bucky flexes his muscles under his clothes, to see how manly he feels even when the ladies are not looking. Then he thinks of Steve alone at home: short, thin, ill more days than not, bitter. No spare muscles to flex, no men in the papers who look like him. Steve is fueled by spite at the indignity of unfairness, brimming with big dreams, humble, quick to joke at the world and himself, desperate to provide, and boundlessly enraged at the pace of change in society. When Steve’s pubescent voice kept breaking, he decided to shout and sing at the top of his lungs to try to get it over with faster. Even when his asthma acts up, he marches slowly at the back of protests to make sure no one is left behind. Bucky cannot imagine a man more real than that. 

2\. 1939. The day Bucky’s body opens up and takes Steve inside him, he is forever changed. He does not lose his virtue at all; he finds it. To be so close to Steve, savoring such a forbidden joy, fully embracing the bodily power he has, he truly feels like a real man. He starts thinking others must be out of their minds not to want this for themselves, to call queer men “fairies” and “inverts” when he has never felt more masculine in his life than when he holds Steve’s cock inside him. He owns this strange and illegal ability to fly to the Moon and back with ecstasy—and has to keep it all to himself. How many men do this and never speak of it openly? 

He is certain there must be thousands. 

3\. 1942. In basic training, Bucky expects to see manhood in the making every day. After all, the Army promises that serving is the fastest way to become a real man. What he sees instead is preparation, evaluations, promotions, posturing, and throughout it all, pretending. Every man around him is collectively and individually pretending: that the war is a good and necessary endeavor, they’ll win and come home, they’ll each be enough, have enough, and do enough to survive and fight to the victorious end. The Army teaches them to be an unstoppable wall of American courage, men who stare death in the face and bring the world to justice. The frantic desire to ignore the scale of the war is contagious. Bucky keeps his mouth shut about it. As he waits for his deployment orders, he begins to pretend as well. 

4\. 1976. For a very long time, fate pushes Bucky into figurative traffic and he is repeatedly run over by a convoy of Hydra vans. Reality doesn’t mean anything to him anymore, and no one treats him like a real man or a real person at all. His body acts outside his control, his mind is vacant and weak, and meanwhile his physical strength is unparalleled. Autonomy, courage, decisiveness, thriftiness, honor-- all his decent qualities once considered “manly” have been stripped away. On the rare occasions he sees women, he is there to kill them or they are there to wipe his memories. Over and over, he does unconscionable deeds without remorse. Life kicks him while he is down and he forgets his mother’s name. Time passes without him.

5\. 2015. Bucky has been living in Steve’s apartment for several weeks. He’s not sure how many. They don’t talk much, but Bucky knows he is still welcome for some reason. Steve keeps his distance while Bucky works on his quiet routine. He diligently reads his deprogramming material from SHIELD, all of which Steve screens beforehand. The material about modern history, culture, politics, and social norms contains hundreds of sections, and Bucky can absorb them at an inhuman pace now that no one electrocutes his brain at regular intervals. In silence, he marinates in the information and works hard to adjust to this reality.

After all the absurd events he has witnessed and been a part of, it still surprises him how much society has changed since he could last call himself a real man. Women have rights he hadn’t dreamed of in the 1940s. But still, so few women control political and economic decisions. Queer people can now fight openly for their dignity and livelihoods in so many places. Rich queers get married, and can live openly happier than ever, but poor, working-class queers, the very image of his younger self, still become homeless. People of color have come so far, all the while being held back at every turn by their white counterparts—and yet they keep fighting, day after day. Bucky imagines that if all these people struggling for justice can find the strength to live and thrive, he can too, in his own small way. He can get better. And one day, he will join these fights alongside them. 

Some men wear dresses now, even on television, and it’s often not for laughs at all. Some men were once called women, and some women used to be called men, and they speak candidly about it and command respect. Learning about this turns the dull jumble of Bucky’s ideas into a colorful landscape, one that he wants to bring to life. Maybe it’s the cornucopia of pride flags, the sea of people with many skin tones marching together, the bright banners of the women marching for their right to choose. Bucky longs to bring more color into his world. He begins to remember how Steve marched, no longer in black words on white paper or sepia-toned photographs but in vivid hues. He was there. They both were. And he was in love with Steve. 

Bucky leaves the apartment on his own for the first time. He writes a note, just in case, although Steve is out on his own errand anyway. He steps outside, meanders until he finds a florist, and purchases the most beautiful bouquet of blooms he can find. Using them as a privacy shield, he goes back to the apartment and arranges them to his heart’s content in the widest-lipped jar in Steve’s place. The display of blossoms is comically huge. It’s perfect. He could never have done this for Steve back in the old days—Steve probably would have taken offense, or someone could have found out. He hopes the times have changed enough by now for this gesture to be welcome. 

He waits for Steve to come home.


End file.
